Colleagues, I am kinda confused here. I am trying to find out the de facto Wireless Sensor Network Simulator. I have done a lot of searching on the Internet with very limited success. The more I search, the greater the number of new simulators that pop up. At some point, I landed on Tranh Minh Tam’s research blog and I felt that long at last, I was going to be helped.But alas! Poor me.The more I looked at Tam’s list of Wireless Sensor Network Simulators, the more I got confused.

Previously, I used to do research on Active Queue Management (AQM) Systems. I have a good working knowledge of NS-2. Then I did not have any problems because NS-2 was the de facto open source simulator for things to do with AQM. Now as I embark on Wireless Sensor Network research, I have discovered that NS-2 on its own does not support WSNs. Some extensions are needed for it to support WSNs. But I have read a number of papers that say that NS-2 is not a good simulator for WSNs even when some extensions have been added. In light of this development, I want someone to let me know the best and most frequently used WSN simulator out there before I commit my precious time to anyone of these simulators. For any simulator that you point out to me, please give some reasons as to why you think it is the best. Your assistance will be greatly appreciated!

Hello sir,
i m vishal from sinhgad collg.of engg…PUNE.
from branch BE E&TC last year.I m working on “cognitive radio system” using OMNet++.From ur disscution on this site i come to know that u r very expert in Omnet++.If U r also from pune,then i m eager to meet u…!

in my project i want to make project in Omnet++ in which there will be 2 sender and one receiver.out of 2 sender , one will start to send packets to receiver.suppose he have to send 50 packets.now say after packet no 27,2nd sender comes and he have highest priority.so 1st sender will pAUSE his communication.2nd sender will transmitt all his packets..then 1st will send his reaming packets(i.e28-50).

….so will u please help me to do this simulation.I AM READY TO PAY FOR UR VALUABLE TIME. but please respond me…i will b very happy by getting ur +ve responce or contact number…if possible, then can we meet?
……
…..WAITING FOR UR RESPONCE….

I am Egyptian, so we couldn’t meet. By the way, your work in cognitive radio is not familiar to me, but the scenario you described about senders and receiver is simple. You should be familiar with Omnet++ and its communication model. Modules communicate through messages. These messages are handled in the handle_message function. You can be familiar with this method by trying the tictoc tutorial bundled with Omnet++. Please, try this tutorial and let me know your feelings.After that I could guide you in the interaction scenario.

Respected sir,
Thank You sir…God is great….i m very happy that u responded me…Thanks again to you (and GOD also)…
Sir,
I had worked already on Tic Toc tutorial…I also have MIXIM frame work.The point is that..I can make a scenario in which there is one server,one passive queue,2 senders and one receiver(giving “queueinglib”as refrance project folder(it is there in Omnet++))..but in my Scenario both the senders sends packets alternately i.e if both have to send 20 packets then 1st seend 1 then oher send 1 then again 1st send packet2 then second send packet2…so on…In “.ini”file there is ‘Priority’ parameter but it doesn’t work…

And i want to make scenario in such way that”-there r 2 senders,one receiver.Say sender1 want to send 30 packets and sender2 wants to send 30 packets…Now at time T=20s sender1 starts sending…to send 1 packet say 2sec required…let he sent 15 packets…Now at this interval (T=15*2+20 sec)sender2 comes….he had highest priority…So he will acquire chanel…will send all packets…then sender1 will send his remained packets”
So i need your help to just impliment this scenario…”How to assign priority to module or how to use “priority” parameter ?” I have less time left in my hand and I got u very lately..so sad !

Once again Thank you for your respnse !

Ahmed Amer said,

in December 21st, 2008 at 3:19 am

I am working in a master thesis in WSN. I searched the net for along period to capture the best simulator and now I have found one that is suitable for may case (Routing Algorithm). The simulator is called Castalia and it is built on top of the popular OMENT++ simulation kernel. What encouraged me to use this sim are: it is an open source simulation composed of many modules that I can replace and plug another , also it is written in C++ and is very easy (for me at least) to understand.

@Ahmed Amer: I was thinking of using NS-2 + Mannasim because I already have a working knowledge of NS-2. I feel that it will be easy for me to get to speed with NS-2 + Mannasim. Before deciding on OMNET++ with Castalia, did u try NS-2+Mannasim? If you did, how was your experience and how do you compare the two?

Hi Jeno,
You should be familiar with OMNet++ to be able to work with Castalia.If you are new to OMNet++, you can take the TicToc tutorial which will help you so much to learn more about OMNet++.
Castalia is a framework built on top of OMNet++. You can read its manual to know how to operate it.

hi
i’m doing my final network project in university.i’m doing research on humidity and temperature wsn. how can i use simulator tool with out any hardware used since the cost of buying the sensor node like mica is too expensive.i don’t have any budget for that.can i just simulate the result by using simulator without the use of hardware?
please!! anyone help me!!

hi
i m new in Castalia and doing a project on WSN.
Can any one tell me how can i get the .vec files that r deleted to generate Castalia-Debug & Primaryoutput.txt?
can ne body tell me how to generate graphs from the out files?

hi sir this is javed shaikh from pune . i will be completing my B.E (electronics) this year from pune university. so for the final year project i am working on wireless sensor networks so would you please forward me some information on it and we are using zig bee modules as a RF device

Sir i’m doing my M.S research program from IIT Delhi in routing algorithm for wireless sensor network and i am interested in Self Organising protocol for wsn using castalia.Con u suggest me How should i proceed? Or can u give me some code related to it.

I am a WSN researcher in Secure Routing field, now a day I am navigating in WSN simulators. realy I am confused in selecting my simulator NS2, NS3, OPNET, OMNET-Castalia or J-SIM.
if any has any recommendations, please share with me

Hello Miss Mariam, I m working also on security for WSN, I will be very happy if you can help me Sir, here is my email: wa-lo@hotmail.fr, plz Sir if you can send me any useful code I ll be very very happy and very thankful.
Best regards

Hi Mariam,
I am working on secure routing for WSN. Can you please tell me what you find as the best simulator?
here is my email: modi9@msn.com
I will be very grateful if you share with me you experince.

I have just started doing research on WSN. I am comfortable with ns2. I am confused on selecting the WSN simulator. please help me which is best WSN simulator. At present lot of simulators are on the net like ns2, J-sim, Castalia, etc.

Hey,
I am a final year student doing my project in WSN routing. Currently am working on simulating spin in ns2 though dont have any lead as of now.
I would be very grateful if anyone could guide me on it.
regards
Vinay

Hello sir,
I am doing my research work for M.Tech in WSN. I am using ns2+mannasim for my work. I have script for design of WSN which is available on mannasim website. But it is not executing in nam. If it can it be really of great use to me. If you know, plz reply to me. Thanks.

hi. i’m working on optimizing WSN lifetime with learning Automata, i do not know how to simulate it in ns-2 or J-sim. i do not know wich one is simplest!
another question is can i use matlab? can i equipe sensor nodes with learning automata in matlab?

I have just started doing research on WSN in data gathering and data aggeagation. . I am confused on selecting the WSN simulator. please help me which is best WSN simulator. At present lot of simulators are on the net like matlab,ns2, J-sim, Castalia,ns3 etc.

Hi Ramana,
My research is similar to yours and I think I am now in the same situation you were.Hope you have reached the end of the road. Can you give me some advice?
which simulator you have used.
thanks in advance

hi..we are doing our final year project on wsn .(for the precision agriculture)…so can u anyone suggest me to which simulator should i use for this …..It would be greatly appreciated if you give me some tips.

hi…..i have just started my thesis work………My problem is that I know my tool—MATLAB—-and my topic related to WSN….but where should i go …i mean where to start from don’t know….could sumbody plz help me…my email ID pluthra13@gmail.com…….

I am Muhsin I have just started my PhD in WSN for the healthcare related applications. I need to select simulator to simulate the performance of my MAC protocols. Please any one knows how to find out the results of Castalia simulator (*.vec) for simulation WSN. I am using Castalia over OMNET++ and I prefer to use GUI in Castalia which is called Tnev.

I have just started my thesis work. The title of my thesis is “WSN for Environment Monitoring”. I aim at increasing network lifetime base on IDEALS/RMR ideas proposed by by Geoff V. Merrett. The desired network nodes feature energy harvesting. Now I have some problems as follow:
Firstly, I have to submit a paper related to my thesis, but I found that it is quite difficult to do this basing on IDEALS/RMR.
Secondly, I have no chance to approach the latest and best research on this field.
At present, I have only one idea that I try to simulate the Merrett’s proposes combining with a real using situation.
Thus, I hope to receive deeply-felt words from all of you. Furthermore, it’s absolutely wonderful if i can co-research with someone on this field.

Hii all,
I am a master student in the german university in cairo. I started my masters project. I am simulating a network which considers taking the shortest path routing algorithm (dijkstra’s) in order maximize the lifetime of wsn considering both minimizing the battery consumption rate and checking the effect of fairly using the bandwidth and node rates amoung all nodes. I already started using Malab for the simulation and was wondering if any of you who works in this field specially using Malab can tell me if Malab will be helpful or not and weather if I should switch to another simulator ??

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